Flex those mental muscles...
I just want to be clear upfront that when I say this, it is not with the Lockdown pressure cooker of ‘you should be sat around learning to macramé houses for orphans using only one chopstick and a tuning fork’ I’m saying it because I believe in constant learning and evolution. I believe that picking up new skills is important – especially if you run your own business.
I’ve always felt that way so I’m lucky that over my corporate career I had the change to take different courses and learn where I could. It gave me a really solid grounding to build on and I’m grateful for it every day. I don’t have the luxury these days of being able to invest time and money into gratuitous learning (if I could I’d be an expert on the middle ages and in robotics, I’d also have that doctorate by now) but each new client and business that I work with offers me opportunities to learn new things that could otherwise be missed.
It’s not always as obvious as a course, it’s not always as easy or as well structured either. Sometimes it’s as simple as putting your hand up and volunteering to take on a project that involves a process you’ve never done before; or saying yes to something and learning how to do it later… those are the ways we continue to learn and develop.
We are lucky enough to have the internet which is such a vast repository of information and learning, there are modules, blogs, forums. If I’m stuck on a complicated formula in Excel and need help I use the forums as chances are, sometimes been there before and had the same issue.
Some of the things I’ve been lucky enough to pick up and run with whilst I’ve been helping clients are:
Amazon listing, maintenance and marketing
Etsy listing and maximising sales
Ebay selling as a business
Opening Facebook shops on business pages and linking the catalogue to Insta
New online tools such as Helium 10 , Canva, Buffer and Preview
Website development (at a simple level) on Squarespace and Wordpress
Using accounting software such as Freshbooks, Quickbooks and Sage
Using movie editing software to create engaging content
Creating simple graphics for use on different social platforms
I couldn’t do any of these things before I started Spinning Plates, all of them I’ve learnt the hard way – through reading, experimenting, refining and repeating until it was perfect.
I’m always happy to say yes to something I don’t know about – and be totally upfront about my ignorance – so that I can learn and develop. Never be scared to pick up something new, be excited because of the opportunities it can bring you.